Yesterday, during my lunchbreak, I read a transcript of a recent lecture given by the former British politician Nigel Lawson at the University of Bath, UK. The subject was 'climate change,' the catch-all phrase that seems to be increasingly used to describe weather events that do not conform to our expectations of a generally benign climate. The person that recommended the article was Robert McCaffrey, the Editor of Global Cement Magazine who is, as regular readers of this column will be aware, something of a climate 'sceptic.' The content of the Lawson article was therefore not a surprise.

The global cement industry, normally a sector that stays 'under-the-radar' of public perception, has seen something of a relative media 'frenzy' in the general population recently. As those familiar with the global cement industry might expect, the recent spike in cement industry interest has been due to the planned LafargeHolcim merger. The story has taken the sector out of the business sections, onto mainstream websites and into the eyeballs of more people than normal.

As a former PhD chemist who moved somewhat diagonally to work for a cement magazine, I have learnt, forgotten and re-learnt a lot of chemistry. While my studies, in which I looked at how to get synthetic molecules to selectively bind to carbon dioxide (CO2), were inherently interesting to me, useful to my supervisor (as a source of funding) and of some use to the wider scientific community, they did not represent what I wanted to do from a long-term perspective.

At the recent Global Boards Conference & Exhibition in London, UK, the conference social evening was held in a function room above a local pub. As delegates left the conference venue for the three minute walk it was raining. At this point, one delegate from Germany made a classic British weather joke. "So... you haven't managed to sort out that problem with the rain yet?" he asked. "No." I replied, quite seriously. "We haven't." He probably wasn't expecting a serious answer.

The UK hadn't solved any problems with its recent 'Winter Storms' at that point. The weather had been causing havoc all over the UK since late December 2013, when the first low pressure systems started to pass across the country. The River Thames flooded to record levels (one of many rivers to burst its banks), the Somerset Levels have been 'lakes' for almost two months now and travel chaos has been widespread. The Cemex UK plant at South Ferriby was flooded. There has been thunder and lightning, hail and even tornadoes in London. It's not all bad news though: Roof repair firms and umbrella salesmen are working overtime.

Since accidentally turning on BBC Grandstand at the age of eight, I have been hooked on Formula One (F1). Watching Nigel Mansell breeze to the 1992 World Championship in the dominant Williams FW14B was the perfect introduction for a young lad to this exhillarating sport. The 3.5L V10 Renault engine in the Williams produced 760hp and was one of the most technologically-advanced racing cars ever built.

It's probably fair to say that F1 is a bit of an addiction for me. I have fallen in and out of love with the sport but still feel compelled to keep watching. For some periods the 'racing' has been very bland, with whole seasons lost to dominant teams. (Get well soon Schumi!) There are disputes that take years to resolve and a steady creep to 'new markets' that seem to neither want nor have the money to host this wasteful pastime.